Sweepstakes Anyone?

Tonight my Family and I were looking through the 2009 HGTV Dream House Giveaway site with drool coming out of the corners of our mouths. I want to win so bad I can taste it. After a lot of dreaming and discussion we agreed we'd be one of the families that just couldn't afford to live in the dream home even if we won it. The reality is that out of the ten homes they have given away only one family chose to live in the HGTV Dream Home instead of selling it. That family went into financial ruin and now face a $639,000 tax bill that they can't afford to pay. I think we'd spend a little time living in it while we were selling it, actually HGTV will buy it from you. We'd use the money to build a less expensive dream home that would still be a heck of a lot nicer than what we have now. Plus I think I'd have to keep a good bit of the furnishings and still get a pretty nice price for it. Anyway as so often happens while surfing the web I got to thinking about entering other sweepstakes online and came across this really cool site that gives away really nice prizes on an ongoing basis. The name of the site is AnyLucky Day. Find out if today is Your Lucky Day here. This week's prize is a really nice Canon MX300 All-In-One Printer
/Copier/Scanner/Fax. Previous contests have awarded prizes such as I-Pods and I-Pod docks.It's free to enter so give it a shot, the odds of winning are probably a billion times greater than winning HGTV's Dream Home.

Survey Spot-Scam or Not?

If you haven't heard already, Surveyspot is a very popular survey site
that pays cash for your answers. That's what devoted Surveyspot members say -- Surveyspot is a great survey site with cash
, prizes, and the opportunity to make money without leaving the house. Simple, right? An investigation into Surveyspot says otherwise, although they are legitimate. So what did this investigation uncover? Believe it or not, a lot of positive things: money is made, Surveyspot isn't a get-rich scam, people actually do win money, the surveys pay -- but when you get paid is an entirely different matter.Here's what you should know about Surveyspot. Surveyspot is a website created by Survey Sampling International, a huge provider for survey sampling solutions. Survey Sampling International was founded in 1977 to provide companies with survey opportunities to help their business. Legitimate survey sites run this way: companies request they send out their surveys for a small fee, the survey site sends the surveys out, and people fill out the survey. The pay entices the average person, the surveys are filled out, the company gets the statistics to better their business, everyone is happy. By filling out a survey, you help a business improve. Without you, business don't improve, and survey sites can't exist -- at least legitimate survey sites.Here are the requirements for joining Surveyspot: You must live in the United States, Canada, or United Kingdom; you must be 18 or older; you must provide a mailing address. Once you join, Surveyspot sends surveys -- at first, only in small amounts. Once you fill it out and prove you're a loyal customer, Surveyspot increases the surveys, throwing in paid surveys also. Not all surveys sent by Surveyspot are paid, but completing a free survey sometimes leads to product tests or another paid survey. This is a plus.A quick note: You'll find that you don't qualify for a lot of surveys. You'll be taken to the Surveyspot page, informed you don't qualify, and taken to a instant win screen. Surveyspot has an instant win sweepstakes you can enter after the end of each survey -- whether you've qualified for it or not. You have two options for entering: a scratch card or a slot machine. Finish these mini-games and you can win 5, 25, or 100 entries into their sweepstakes. You can win many things, including $25,000.Does this review sound too good yet? Here comes the bad part: when they pay you. Surveyspot isn't fast, quick, or reliable. They're famous for this. Your money won't be credited into your account until the company verfies all information and reports it to Surveyspot -- believe it or not, you won't see money in your account for up to 6 weeks. After you're done waiting for your money to appear in said account, you can request your money sent as cash. That's if you made the $5.00 minimum payout, of course.Then you wait. You wait, and you wait. You wait for weeks for Surveyspot to receive your money request, and when they verify it, a check is sent out. And you wait some more.Impatient yet? Your check should arrive in 4 to 6 weeks, depending on where you live. By the time you've forgotton about your check, you'll receive your money in the mail, ready to be cashed. It's a long, bothersome wait, but at least you got your money!Surveyspot isn't that bad though -- it's just not great for impatient folks who need cash fast. Surveyspot pays more money than other sites, ranging from $3-$5. $10-$20 surveys exist, but they're rare. You get paid (eventually) and it won't screw you out of money, but don't depend on it for quick money. Surveyspot isn't quick. It's efficient. If you want fast money, go elsewhere.
About the Author
J.D. Carr is co-founder of GotWebMojo.com, a free community, training, and online solutions company specializing in assisting artists, musicians, writers, and entrepreneurs. To join for free, visit GotWebMojo.com.

Stay at Home Moms-What do we do All Day?

O.K. Someone finally had the gall to ask "What do Stay at Home Moms do all Day?" My Husband is smart enough that it wasn't him! You have got to read this wonderful column from Carolyn Hax who is a style column writer for The Washington Post. Even I didn't realize just how much we stay at home moms do . The hand that rocks the cradle truly rules the world!

Make Money Online

In my everlasting research on ways to make money online I came across a blog that you definitely need to check out. The guy's name is Grizz and he tells you in detail exactly what he does to make more than $70,000 a month online. The best part is he isn't trying to sell you a darn thing. Unlike the million and one make money online scams he's really giving advice on the best ways to make money online. Most of them deal with SEO and keywords but he does have some great information on Google adsense and Project Payday with screen shots of the payments from the money he makes online each month. Well worth a look . Read every bit you can, I did and already I am making more money online through Google adsense. Check out Grizz's How to Make Money Online Blog HERE. Drop me a comment and let me know what you think.

Send Free SMS Text Messages Online

Hey Guys-just to help save a little money we have only one cellphone in the house, whoever leaves takes it with them. Sometimes you just need to send a SMS text though so I found this really cool application that lets you send free SMS text messages online. I installed it over there to the right so you can send your own free text message to anyone with a cell phone. It's free, no catch nothing to sign up for, you don't even have to enter your e-mail address. You can send as many free sms text messages as you want and never pay a cent. The only problem is they can't text you back so you need to keep your free text messages short and to the point. That's it have fun with it come back anytime you want to send a text message online!

Promoting My Home Business

Sorry I haven't posted in a while but running your own at home business is very time consuming! You would think it would be so much easier not to get up everyday and haul yourself off to your 9-5 but the reality of a home business at least in the beginning is that you are working on some aspect of it seven days a week. Since taking the leap to start my business at home-I do Pet Grooming, things have been building up pretty steadily. I have been self-promoting everywhere I go. I made a little postcard flyer that I designed at Avery.com and I leave some everywhere I go. Since my particular at home business is dog grooming I really want to establish a good relationship with the vets in town so I made sure to introduce myself to them and explain what kinds of services I was offering. I also went out to our local S.P.C.A to volunteer some time. I let them know that I was willing to groom some of their dogs that were in bad shape in the hopes that they would get a nice home now that they looked more like a doggy and less like a leafpile with knots in it. I did let them know that my motives were not entirely altruistic, I hoped to get some referrals from there and possibly a newspaper story about the groomer who was generously donating time to help the dogs in need. See we all win, the dogs get fixed up and I get customers for my home-business. I have also spent some time going door to door in nearby neighborhoods promoting my home business. That has worked out pretty well, people tend to favor a face to face meeting. Always have your appointment book with you wherever you go. I even handed out a business card at a traffic light the other day! I was returning a load of customer's dogs and they all happened to be standing on their hind legs and looking out the windows of my Explorer naturally this attracted the attention of the car next to me so I rolled down the window and gave her a business card. The point is hand out promotional materials for your home business wherever you go. Usually the first rule of opening your business is Location, Location, Location but in the case of a home business it is Promote, Promote, Promote

Legitimate Paid Survey Site

I wanted to share my earnings for Inbox dollars since I signed up last month. Like I said they are kinda slow but if you really worked at it they definitely would add up quicker. Scroll down further in my blog for the paid survey link to inbox dollars. Make sure you put your own referral link on your page as they pay you for those too. I am going to spend a little more time doing paid surveys this month there just to see what kind of earnings are possible. I like them because they don't promise you You can make $5,000 in a week and stuff like that. They are simply a legitimate paid survey site that gets paid from advertisements and passes a small amount of that revenue on to you.
Earnings at Inbox Dollars so far:

Signup Bonuses
1
$5.00
Mailings Read
36
$0.72
Cash Offers Earning
8
$4.25
Cash Surveys Earnings
4
$1.50
Cash Games Earnings

0
$0.00
Cash Shopping Earnings
0
$0.00
Miscellaneous Earnings

0
$0.00
Referral Rewards 1
0
$0.00
Total Current Earnings:
$11.47
Referral Information 2
Number of Referrals
0

Dog Grooming At Home

As I wrote about in an earlier post it is a vital first step in starting your own work from home business to sit down and think about what your unique skill set is. I have groomed dogs for more than 20 years always for other people that took a chunk of my earnings so of course dog grooming features high on my list of skills to consider working from home. I haven't had much time to post because I spent some time promoting my at home dog grooming business.You wouldn't believe how hard it was to come up with a name but I finally did-Hot Doggies it conveys everything I wanted it to. Since I had little or no money for advertising I had to come up with low-cost ways of business promotion. One very important one was business cards (very unprofessional to scratch your number on a piece of paper. I bought business card stock from Wal-Mart and headed over to Avery.com. They have a great selection of business promotion items like business cards, postcards and stationary. Best of all it's all free! You can design whatever project you want on Avery's even a monkey can do it online program and using your own printer print them out. Voila you've got free business cards for your at home business. While I was at Avery I also designed some mail-out postcards I just printed these out on some heavier than normal regular printer paper so I saved the extra expense of special post card paper. I am going to mail these out in small batches whenever I have some extra postage money. I am just using the phone book and mailing them at random. Most at home businesses would have success with this. Why buy a list of addresses when the telephone company drops a free one on your doorstep. Read up on some flyer making tips to design the perfect advertisement. I also used the same postcards for my at home grooming business and handed them door to door in neighborhoods around me. I have already gotten several calls about these. Once you've thought of your own at home business idea head over and make up your own free business cards it makes you feel so professional.

Make Money at Home Selling Crossword Puzzles

Chances are if you are here reading this two things are probably true, one you need or would like to make more money and two you are fairly literate to some degree anyway.Maybe like me you are in love with words and any form of them including puzzles. In my neverending research of ways to make money online I made a fascinating discovery-you can make a ton of money submitting original crossword puzzles to various publications, If this sounds like an interesting proposition to you, read on...

Work at Home Business

You're staying home but the bills keep rolling in. One of the most important things for you to do is sit down and have a brainstorming session either with yourself or with a partner. What kind of work can you do from home? Come up with some honest answers about what your skills are.

If you are a writer you can make a decent living doing freelance jobs especially if you already have some published work. Freelance Writing Jobs is a well written blog that list some places to find good paying work at home writing jobs.

Avon is still a great opportunity to make some extra money especially if you have a large network of contacts. Visit their official site for information on becoming a representative.

If you are crafty and have a unique idea a great place to start your at home craft business is Etsy.It's free to register and you can have your very own e-store up and operating within hours.

Working mothers are always looking for quality home child care. There is a lot of money to be made here. If you love children this could be the way to go. The Dabbling Mum offers an ebook on starting your at home child care business that covers absolutly everything you need to know.

Whatever idea you come up with remember not to put all your eggs in one basket but don't spread yourself too thin either. It may take a few tries before you come up with a successful work at home business.

Get Money for Old Cell Phones

We've all seen the ads on television about getting cash for your old gold jewelry, I even sent a broken gold chain in and got $40 for it in about five days! Did you know that those outdated cell phones taking up space in your junk drawer are actually worth something?I still can't figure out why we don't throw away things like that even though we are never going to use them again but the fact is most of us have at least one cell phone hanging around(I have several that made a trip through the washing machine-they didn't make it)and working or not here is what you can do with them both to keep them out of the ever-growing landfill and to put a little extra money in your pocket. Click on the cell phones for a link to my article with step by step instructions to Get Money for Your Old Cell Phone. You'd make even more collecting them from friends and family.

Legit Paid Survey Site

I wanted to share another site with you that I make a little money at-keep in mind that most of these survey sites are total scams but so far this one seem legitimate although it does take quite a while to reach the $30 payout level I really don't do much more than read a couple of e-mails that they send to my e-mail each day. Granted they are only worth a few cents each but they add up. you can also make money a bit more quickly by taking surveys and signing up at their sponsor sites many of which are free to join. So if you don't mind a little more spam in your box (you can cancel these at any time) head over and take a look.

Make Money Writing for E-How

This is one of my favorite ways to make money online. I get paid to write how-to articles on E-How.com. Simply sign up at their site for the writers compensation program. you must have a paypal account in order to receive monthly payments. They have a very easy to use format for writing articles. The how-to articles follow a step-by-step format. You are paid based on page views and visitors clicking on the ads on your pages. Spend some time in the community forum. E-How is a very friendly, helpful community of writers from all walks of life that never hesitate in sharing knowledge to help you develop SEO and keyword skill that are vital to making money online. The minimum payout is $10 in one month but I reached that the first month, in fact I doubled it. The second month I doubled the first month and I am on track to make even more money this month. The best thing about it is that it is residual income, once you write and publish your article it continues to make money without you having to do anything to it. The secrets to successful online money making at E-How are keywords, article quality and writing a lot of articles. The more you write the more money you will make. There are several writers on e-how that make several thousand dollars a month writing. Two of them have e-books that are extremely helpful in helping you maximize your online money making. Janet Ford's e-book can be found here. Another prolific e-how writer who will show you how me makes his living online is Anthony Delgado. They are both really nice people Janet has been busy trying to get her book published so we miss her in the forums. Anthony's wife Jamie is also busy writing for money on E-How.

Quit Your Day Job

I have 5 kids at home. I did something really scary. I QUIT MY JOB! I was working just to pay the babysitter. So here's the problem, the bills are still coming in and those darn house elves still want to eat three times a day (sometimes more) While I was working I was dabbling a bit in making money online but now this has become my fulltime job. I have to make money online and I am going to share with you some of the ways I do it. Some of these ways earn only pennies and some are pretty decent earners but it all adds up.